While I haven't had a chance to get her paper, of which I'm very
interested, I have been working on a acadmic paper that looks at changes in
the labor market in the Chicago Metropolitan Statistical Area
(MSA)--because of changing definitions by the US Census Bureau, I include
Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry and Will counties across all of the
Illinois data. Because of getting ready to take my special field exam for
my PhD in Sociology, I am unable to finish it off right now, but the data I
report right here is solid. I will share some job data I've collected for
both the US and Chicago.
In my study, I combine construction, manufacturing, and
transportation, communications and public utilities (hereafter, TCPU)
together in what I call the "transformative" sector of the economy--the
rest are services. (Because my study focuses on the Chicago MSA, I exclude
mining as it is less than 1% of all employment in this area.) I had
initially set up my study to end in 1993, and I have not been able to
update it--but will eventually. But let me share what I have.
For the US: construction peaked at 5.171 M jobs in 1989, and
declined to 4.574 M in 1993 (it had been as low as 4.471 M in 1992).
Manufacturing peaked at 20.285 M in 1980, and was down to 17.802 M in 1993.
TCPU peaked at 5.793 M in 1990, and declined to 5.708 in 1993. Together,
this transformative sector (again, excluding mining) peaked at 30.187 M in
1989 and was down to 28.084 M in 1993. Transformative sector jobs, which
were 44% of all jobs in 1960, only comprised 26% of all jobs in 1993.
(This data take from the US Statistical Abstract, 1993: 420, Table 654).
As far as percentage of jobs in US, construction provided 5% of all
jobs (excluding mining) from 1960 to 1990, and dropped to 4% between
1990-93; manufacturing which provided 31% of all jobs in 1960, was down to
16% in 1993; and TCPU which provided 7% of total jobs in 1960 and 1965,
dropped to 6% from 1970-1980, and has provided 5% since 1985 to 1993.
(Data computed from same source.)
Now for some Chicago MSA data (and I'll keep it brief) for the
transformative sector only: Cook County (in which Chicago is located) lost
an overage of 16,366 manufacturing jobs EVERY YEAR between 1967-1993, for a
total number of 425,515 manufacturing jobs lost in this county during these
years. At the same time, in the rest of the MSA (including regional
construction, regional TCPU, and manufacturing outside of Cook
County)--i.e., by "regional" I mean the six county MSA, so that includes
Cook County except for manufacturing--there were an average of 6,176 jobs
created every year between 1967-93, for a total of 160,571 transformative
sector jobs created. That means that there still was a NET LOSS of 10,190
transformative sector jobs EVERY YEAR between 1967-1993 in this six county
area, and a NET LOSS of 264,944 transformative sector jobs between 1967-93
in this MSA.
Percentage of jobs in Chicago MSA: construction has provided 4% of
the region's total jobs (excluding mining) between 1967-93; manufacturing,
which provided 39% of total jobs in 1967, only provided 20% in 1993; TCPU,
which was 7% of total jobs in 1967 was only 6% in 1993. And transformative
sector jobs as percentage of all jobs was 50% in 1967, but was only 30% in
1993. (Chicago MSA data taken from various years of County Business
Patterns--Illinois, which is prepared by the US Department of Commerce.
The last issue, containing 1993 data, was published in 1995.)
Now, is there deindustrialization going on--is the US
deindustrializing? (As claimed by Barry Bluestone and Bennett Harrison in
their 1982 book, THE DEINDUSTRIALIZATION OF AMERICA--and, in fairness, I
doubt they would make the same claim today.) While there has been
significant job loss in manufacturing, I do not see that the US is
deindustrializing. What Bluestone and Harrison did not consider is the
number of jobs being created (even in manufacturing) at the same time jobs
were being destroyed.
The biggest issue is that there has been such a vast increase in
service sector jobs: service sector jobs (as I have defined them, and not
according to the US Dept of Commerce--the difference is I include TCPU in
the transformative sector, while Commerce includes them in service sector)
have increased from 29.751 M in 1960 (56% of all jobs, excluding mining) to
81.495 M in 1993 (74% of all jobs). (This data is computed from the
Statistical Abstract, 1993, as above.) Remember, also, that the service
sector jobs are not all "hamburger flippers"--this includes jobs like
lawyers, management consultants, doctors (i.e., high skilled) as well as
retail workers in ice cream stores (i.e., low skilled).
Because of the large increase in service jobs, although
transformative sector jobs have declined a little, transformative jobs are
a considerably smaller proportion of jobs in the US economy. But there
were more transformative jobs in 1993 than there were before 1975; and
there were more manufacturing jobs in 1993 than there were in 1960!
Again, I have to update this data, but it is valid up to 1993.
In any case, there has been considerable job loss even while other
jobs have been created. What I see is that it has been jobs that have been
accessible to those who have a high school degree or less that have been
being destroyed, while those with post secondary training (say skilled
apprenticeships, vocational school, and college) are doing better. What I
see is that post-secondary training is almost a requirement for ability to
even hope to get a good job, although it is no guarantee that one will hold
on to it once obtained. For those with only a high school degree or less,
things are MUCH bleaker--including a greater rate of lost wages, etc. And
since it's only been recently that over 50% of the adult population has
post-secondary training, these changes are affecting an incredible number
of people in this country.
In other words, not all jobs are the same, and not everybody even
has access to all jobs. To understand what is happening with the job
situation, we must disaggregate the data.
Hope this has been useful. If anybody is unclear concerning the
above data, let me know and I'll try to clarify. With best wishes--Kim
>Stefanie Schmidt of the Milken Institute, whose done some interesting work
>showing no secular increase in job loss anxiety among the U.S. workforce,
>sent me an earlier working paper she did for the Institute (which can be
>ordered on their web site, www.mijcf.org) reviewing the job loss/retention
>literature. Though there are some complexities and contradiction in the
>details, basically it appears that there's no great increase in job loss
>(and no decline in tenure) over the last 15-20 years.
>
>So what's going on? Is the literature wrong? Where does the popular
>perception of increased volatility come from? Is it that turbulence has hit
>a formerly protected area - white collar white guys - which means increased
>media attention to a problem the rest of the labor force has always known?
>Will Alan Greenspan discover this and double the fed funds rate?
>
>By the way, folks in the New York area can hear me interview Schmidt
>tomorrow (Thursday) at around 5:15 NYC time, WBAI, 99.5 FM. Before she
>comes on, I'll interview Edie Rassel of the Economic Policy Institute on
>the study they did jointly with the Institute for Women's Policy Research
>on the growth of nontraditional work arrangements. Following Schmidt will
>be someone talking about organizing the Silicon Valley workforce, and
>following that a report on the Havana conference on international labor
>solidarity.
>
>Doug
>
>--
>
>Doug Henwood
>Left Business Observer
>250 W 85 St
>New York NY 10024-3217 USA
>+1-212-874-4020 voice +1-212-874-3137 fax
>email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>web: <http://www.panix.com/~dhenwood/LBO_home.html>
